


in sickness and in health (with health being less likely)

by thehobbem



Category: Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Action, F/M, Fluff, Humor, I'm not too graphic about it bc I don't like graphic violence, Post-Canon, Post-TRoS, Romance, also: mention of finnpoe, and also losing limbs in the greatest of star wars traditions, but Ben is obvs alive bc fuck that, but there ARE mentions of faceless enemies dying, cw: fight scene, one shared brain cell, which is nowhere to be found throughout this fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-21
Updated: 2021-02-21
Packaged: 2021-03-13 18:13:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,188
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29282808
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thehobbem/pseuds/thehobbem
Summary: Deciding to spend the rest of their lives together is the easy part for both Rey and Ben; the trouble is in how topropose.
Relationships: Ben Solo & Rose Tico, Chewbacca & Ben Solo, Finn & Rey (Star Wars), Rey/Ben Solo | Kylo Ren
Comments: 32
Kudos: 76
Collections: To Find Your Kiss: The Reylo Fanfiction Anthology's Valentine's Day Exchange





	in sickness and in health (with health being less likely)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [bluebutterflykisses](https://archiveofourown.org/users/bluebutterflykisses/gifts).



**I**

If anyone asked him, Ben Solo would say not much has changed in Ajan Kloss over the last year.

“The Harris wrench, please,” he says, stretching his hand from under the ship.

“A Harris wrench? I’m afraid I don’t know which one that is, sir.”

Ben doesn’t reply, and stoically keeps his hand stretched out, knowing what’s going to happen next.

As he predicted, there’s a succinct beep, followed by a “This one? Oh, that one! Thank you, Artoo.” Then, in response to a string of brisk beeps, there’s an indignant, “How am I supposed to know? I’m not an astromech droid!” as he places the tool in Ben’s hand.

“Thank you, Threepio. Artoo, be patient with him,” he mutters, his focus back on his task. He gets a short, disgruntled beep in reply that he chooses to ignore.

The C-3PO/R2 relationship is only one of the many things that have not changed in the last year (or in the thirty-one years Ben has been alive). Most of what makes this place the Resistance headquarters in his eyes has remained the same to him.

But that’s not factually true, is it? Not really. He spent a lot of his initial time in the base in near-isolation in a makeshift prison built exclusively for him and, to this day, he prefers to isolate himself from others by staying in his own small quarters, or inside the _Falcon,_ or under it, making the tiniest, most unnecessary adjustments, just like now — but even he can see the number of people around the base has increased exponentially since he first arrived. He’s memorized their faces, names, roles, and even home planets, with an ease diametrically opposed to the effort most of them put into never saying _his_ name or looking at _him_ in the face. Not that he blames them, it’s just how things are. If anything, Ben has always been very prompt in accepting what is, instead of fighting for what should be; _too_ prompt, in fact, which in hindsight probably worked to his own detriment. But well, that’s just crying over spilled nerf-milk.

It’s also hard to miss the way the base went from a make-do, hastily built camp in the wilderness to an actual installation. And so rationally, Ben knows there have been a lot of changes.

But none of them has changed anything for him.

He still hears the occasional terrified whisper of ‘Kylo Ren’ when he walks by. He still doesn’t get called into any sort of meeting, unless the generals need his inside knowledge as the ‘former Supreme Leader of an intergalactic military regime’, which is the greatest, most diplomatic understatement Ben has ever heard. He’s still not allowed to take a single step not previously approved by the High Command, and he still scares that Beaumont guy when he happens to so much as breathe in his general vicinity.

Most importantly, he still doesn’t have a lot of people to talk to: Rose Tico, the only one to treat him as if he weren’t one of the worst things that has ever happened to the galaxy (an unbelievable improvement from the first time they met, when she stunned Ben with an electro-shock prod until he was unconscious, setting back his recovery by a whole week); Chewie and Lando, who are more often on missions off-planet; General Dameron, who talks to him a whole lot (or, more precisely, he talks _at_ Ben a lot, like he’s physically incapable of shutting up; a fascinating concept, if it weren’t so exhausting); C-3PO and R2, who won’t leave him alone, much to his surprise… and Rey.

A total of seven sentient beings in the entire galaxy are willing to talk to him (which is seven more than what he used to have as Kylo Ren).

So all in all, if anyone asks — not that anyone will get close enough to — he’ll say not a lot has changed for him, personally. He is now as he was a year ago, when Rey brought him from Exegol. The only differences are that now breathing doesn’t hurt, he can use both of his legs to walk, and he has a change of clothes.

Modifications made for the day, Ben comes out from under the ship, shielding his eyes from the sunlight. Ajan Kloss is always so thoroughly bathed in light, so thoroughly the opposite of the _Supremacy,_ that it continues to catch him off-guard sometimes. As his eyes adjust, he sees Rey talking to Connix a few meters away.

He stays exactly where he is, looking on.

Whatever Connix is saying, it has Rey scrunching up her nose in laughter.

This, right here, is something else that hasn’t changed in him. He is as sure of it now as he was a year ago.

The suspicion that awoke in him the first time he saw Rey scrunching up her nose (as she tried to escape, to hide, and to shoot at him all at once) had grown into certainty too fast; by the time he made the supremely stupid move of throwing his lightsaber into the ocean and flying to Exegol with nothing but a thirty-year-old blaster to confront the greatest Sith Lord in modern galactic history, he had never been surer of anything in his entire life.

A very distressed BB-8 rolls towards Rey with a series of anxious beeps: his antenna is crooked again (what _does_ this droid do to get his antenna bent out of shape so often? Dameron needs to look into that). With a serious air that may fool a droid but does not fool Ben, not even from this distance, Rey kneels down and gets to work on the antenna; she looks as if she’s reproaching him, her forehead slightly knit as she talks to him, but the careful way her hands move as she fixes the droid tells a story of care and affection.

That certainty rises once again in his chest, warm and light and _present_ , filling every nook and cranny in him until it feels like he’s never been empty in his entire life. And maybe, just maybe, he never was. Maybe she’d been there all this time, waiting for him.

“Threepio.”

“Yes, Master Ben?”

“Could you tell me again what it was my mother said?”

“Yes, sir. According to my memory bank, she said…”

_“It was right there on the Endor moon, after everything.”_

_“After uncle Lando and uncle Wedge blew up the Death Star!” said Ben, excitedly sitting up on his bed._

_His mom gently made him lie back again. “Just then,” she agreed._

Ben does his best to ignore the prick of pain that comes every time he remembers his mother’s voice or smile. Setting his jaw, he lets the memory wash over him as C-3PO continues to recite the words.

_“Why didn’t you wait to get married here in Chandrila?”_

_She didn’t answer right away, her hand running softly through his hair for so long he thinks she didn’t hear him, until she finally says in a quiet voice:_

_“There was so much left to do. That day was just the beginning of something much greater, but I couldn’t wait anymore. I had to do it before I missed the chance, before I had another battle to fight somewhere else. I had this unshakeable feeling, this… certainty. I just knew.” Her eyes seemed to come back from a place far, far away and to refocus on him, and she smiled._

_“And one day you will know too, Ben.”_

“Those were her exact words, sir,” the droid concludes.

“Thank you, Threepio,” Ben replies quietly.

Sometimes, he wonders if he could be any less similar to his mother than he is now; unlike her, he has never quite known who he is or what he is supposed to be. He still doesn’t, in fact. That, too, hasn’t changed.

As he ponders over that, Rey stands up and, after sending Beebee-Ate on his way, she turns around and finds Ben watching her. With a sudden smile that brightens up her face, a smile that almost convinces him there’s no one else she would rather find, Rey gives him a small wave that makes him feel like his chest is caving in on itself.

An unshakeable feeling. A certainty.

Maybe he and his mother are not so different after all.

**II**

It never ceases to amaze Rey how much has changed around Ajan Kloss in the past year.

As she makes her way towards the clearing they shamelessly call “the docking area”, she wonders how much longer they’ll stay here. The New Republic is slowly being rebuilt, and it’s only a matter of time until they move to a more central planet; Poe, Finn, and the rest of the High Command have managed to get hold of the few senators still alive, contact the planets who had lost their own representatives, and start working together towards a new Galactic Senate — a far cry from where they were a year ago, with no allies, barely any ships and weapons, and only a glimmer of hope.

Even the headquarters themselves have changed, reborn into a slick, looming facility that reminds Rey a bit too much of the _Supremacy._ A deeply unwelcome comparison, as she learned from Rose’s horrified gape and Poe’s ominous squinting, but it’s the only place she’s ever been in that’s remotely similar to this. Not that she’s been to a lot of places.

It’s not like she’s stuck on Ajan Kloss, exactly. There’s no shortage of missions off-planet, but she’s only sent to places where they need a Jedi with a lightsaber; Poe tried taking her on a diplomatic meeting once ( _“the impression the last Jedi in the galaxy will make!”_ ) and once had been enough for everyone involved to realize she was as helpful in a royal court as a wampa at an antique shop.

 _“I_ told you _Ben would be much more useful here!”_

 _“And I_ told you _I’m not taking Kylo Ren, Supreme Leader of the First Order, to meet the provisional government of Coruscant! I want them to work with us, not shoot us.”_

Fine, even Poe Dameron is allowed to have a point sometimes. Not many know that Ben Solo and Kylo Ren were one and the same, but it’s hard to tell how fast and widely word spread after Ben had “surrendered” to the Resistance.

_“Surrendered?! He helped save the galaxy!”_

_“What do you want me to tell the senators? ‘Hi everyone, remember Kylo Ren? Well, he’s good now! He’s opened himself to the good side for a pair of pretty eyes!’”_

In the end, Ben had been sentenced to a few months of prison and years of parole and community service, and he’s not allowed to go off-planet without permission from Poe or Finn _._ If it were up to Finn, Ben would never even set foot outside the Resistance building — he avoids and distrusts Ben like a plague, and only talks to him when strictly necessary. Poe, on the other hand, frequently allows him to go with Rey on missions that seem to require _two_ lightsabers. Those are few and far between, though, and her moments alone with Ben on the Falcon have been rarer and rarer.

Which is why she tries to steal whatever sliver of time she can throughout the day. Some days are busy with plans and decisions and strategic meetings; others, like today, are days of diplomatic meetings when she has little, if anything, to do, which means one thing: finding Ben.

The process is always less straightforward than it should be: there’s always at least one child that wants to talk to her or fix a toy, Resistance members who want to say hi, people who haven’t been here for long who still marvel at the sight of the last Jedi and stop her for little reason other than to gawk at her. And so, what should be something as simple as walking over to the Falcon and calling a name invariably turns into an obstacle course.

At last, after two children, a Snap, a Jess, a pilot whose name she doesn’t remember, and a long conversation with Klaud about a T-70 that has seen better days, Rey finally sees the Falcon. Next to it, C-3PO and R2, and underneath it, a pair of long, thick legs Rey would recognize anywhere.

Before she can get any closer, however, another obstacle shows up in the shape of Kaydel (which is a bit of an unfair way to think of her friend, but some days are made of patience, while some are not). During their conversation, Rey observes a hand extending from under the Falcon every now and then, patiently waiting while C-3PO fumbles around with the tools and R2 complains. The scene repeats itself a couple of times — but the third time, Ben himself comes out and talks to the two of them like a parent to his children. The _endless_ patience Ben never fails to display with the bumbling pair of droids is a constant source of amazement to Rey; she would never have thought him capable of it a year or two ago.

And yet, somehow, it suits him. Patience and calm _suit_ him, like old, comfortable clothes he suddenly remembered he had lying around in the back of his wardrobe. And even in small moments, when those old clothes slip away and Rey sees the seething anger trying to boil its way to the surface (the anger she’s not quite sure will ever leave him, but that’s fine: she has plenty of it herself, too), she also sees him taking deep breaths and willing it down, back to the bottom of his wardrobe where it’s best left forgotten.

That’s when she realizes how much things have changed, including herself.

Two years ago, she had been engulfed in too many certainties, one after the other in a desperate sequence of landslides that kept stealing the sand from under her feet and the air from her lungs: first, the certainty that Kylo Ren wanted — _yearned_ — to be Ben Solo again, but didn’t know how to; then, that he would take her hand and her help if she offered; that she _wanted_ to; that _he_ wanted her to; that he, improbably and impossibly, wanted _her;_ finally, that she couldn’t help someone who wouldn’t help himself. That she wasn’t enough for him the same way she’d never been enough for anyone else.

And just when she’d settled in the hole built out of that very last certainty, he’d come for her. Improbably, impossibly, he’d come for her like an avalanche, burying facts she’d taken as immutable truths, proving her initially right by proving her ultimately wrong.

Everything she had ever believed had been taken away from her — sometimes methodically dismantled for parts, sometimes destroyed in an unceremonious crash landing. But from the moment that, through the Force bond, she saw his face — bloody, bruised and beaten up, but with eyes that had never been more alive — Rey had been sure of it. So sure, in fact, that it had stopped her in her tracks and filled her up to her throat so quick she thought she might suffocate from it.

A year later, and that certainty was the only one that remained in the middle of so much incessant change.

When Kaydel leaves, just as Rey takes the first step towards the Falcon, there’s a series of frantic beeps at her feet, and she finds an afflicted BB-8 showing her his crooked antenna.

“Beebee-Ate,” she says, hoping her voice conveys all the reproach and none of the amusement she feels, “Again? Really?”

More frantic beeping, and she raises her eyebrows.

“Right. It’s never your fault.” She kneels down and starts working on the antenna, making a mental note to talk to Poe about it. He’s got a lot of nerve to go all ‘What did you do to my droid?’ on her, but at the same time, let his droid get up to _the stars know what,_ often enough to get damaged every week.

Antenna straightened once again, Rey stands up and sends the droid on his way; she turns around, hoping Ben hasn’t finished and walked away — only to find him standing by the ship, gazing at her. And just like that, that feeling, that _certainty,_ shoots through her heart, fills her up all over again and ends in a smile she gives him like she would anything else she had. (She also gives him a little awkward wave, but she ignores that, because there’s no part of her that isn’t awkward.)

She’s had her fair share of breakable certainties over the past couple of years, enough to last her a lifetime, and she’s learned to recognize them for what they are.

This, right here, isn’t it.

This is something that refused to break no matter how much she actively tried, or how many reasons she had to break it. This is the only thing that will never change.

It’s time she actually said it out loud.

**III**

_“He even asked your uncle Luke to walk me down the clearing,” she said, smiling at the memory, before she thickened her voice in what Ben thought at the time to be an uncanny imitation of his dad’s voice. “Hey kid. Could you, uh, maybe walk her down the clearing? Since you’re apparently brother and sister and all.”_

_Ben creased his forehead. “Why ‘apparently’? Didn’t he know?”_

_Puzzled, he watched his mother hold back laughter. “He did not. It was a surprise for— for everyone that day. So your uncle walked me down the clearing, and your dad met me in the middle, and we walked together the rest of the way, because that’s how we did it in Alderaan.”_

_“But dad isn’t from Alderaan.”_

_“No, but he wanted me to have an Alderaanian wedding, so he asked Threepio about our customs.”_

“Threepio?”

“Yes, Master Ben?”

“Do you know anything about Jakkuvian weddings?”

There’s only C-3PO and himself in his dorm. It’s a small room, far from the vast, empty expanses he had back on the _Finalizer_ or the _Supremacy,_ but he never needed or wanted that much room in the first place. The sheer size of it only emphasized how little he had. This here is much better: there’s a bed where he actually fits, a corner to leave his small pile of clothes and his boots, and a couple of shelves for his few books and his new calligraphy set. He’s never been more comfortable.

One single problem plagues this room, though: ever since C-3PO and R2 _imprinted_ on him, they “sleep” in his bedroom as well. The… loyalty, if that is even the right word, is much appreciated, but their presence means that Ben, who still doesn’t quite know how to have a full night’s sleep, often wakes up in a sweat in the middle of the night, startled by a beep or C-3PO’s golden sheen.

Well, he’ll pay that price as close to ‘happily’ as he knows how to get.

And now, at least, as he lies in bed and stares at his ceiling, Ben can make good use of the droid’s endless memory bank. He doesn’t know anything about Alderaanian wedding customs beyond what he learned from his mom’s story, nor about Chandrilan ones — he’d left home too early for his mom to teach him about those — but since this is about Rey, it’s better he focus on _her_ customs.

C-3PO answers his question with a cheery, “I do, sir! Are you attending one soon?”

That gets a dry chuckle out of Ben. “Hopefully, Rey’s.” He’s pretty sure C-3PO won’t understand the implication, but he makes the small joke for himself anyway.

To his surprise, C-3PO’s reaction is not an excited “Oh, what wonderful news!”, or something of the sort, followed by a list of facts about Jakku; what he gets instead is:

“Oh. But sir, I believe Rey is not from Jakku.”

Ben turns his head and stares at the droid.

Huh.

He’s always liked C-3PO. He’s actually, unabashedly _fond_ of the droid — to the point that, back when he was stuck at the Jedi Temple with Luke, C-3PO frequently featured, sometimes even starred, in many of his favorite memories from home. Having him around now, treating him like the child of Han Solo and Leia Organa instead of the Supreme Leader Kylo Ren, is one of the things that anchors Ben in the knowledge that, yes, he _can_ still be Ben Solo after all.

But not once has it ever occurred to him, or his parents, or Luke, to say to the droid what he says now:

“You’re right,” he says slowly. A state of events unheard of, to be sure, but even C-3PO is allowed to have a point sometimes. It’s also somewhat of a revelation to realize that, while easily giving up the word ‘scavenger’, his brain refuses to let go of the ‘from Jakku’ part.

“She… kind of hates it there, doesn’t she?”

“She has expressed a strong dislike for it in the past, sir.”

Right. Well, no problem. He’ll just have to look into wedding traditions from… from…

His thoughts trail off into a slow halt, and he frowns. Looks at the ceiling once again, racking his brains for a piece of information he doesn’t seem to have, before turning back to the droid.

“Where is she from?”

“You mean Rey? Oh!” C-3PO seems as stunned as he is, which is an amazing feat, given that the stunned look is part of his design. “Goodness me, sir, I don’t believe I know! She has never spoken about it with me.”

 _Nor with me,_ Ben thinks. He briefly considers asking Rose, or even Finn, but these are probably long shots: the truth of the matter is that Rey herself most likely doesn’t know, which means he must think of something else.

_ Tai would know what to do,  _ he thinks, not for the first time in the past nine years. The difference is that now he embraces the thought, instead of locking it away inside a box where he kept everything else that hurt — everything against which he shielded himself behind a mask in the first place.

_ He’d probably tell me to focus on what I know, instead of what others might think.  _ So what  _ does _ he know about Rey that could aid his proposal?

_She likes to eat. A lot. As much as she can, all the time. She’ll eat rocks if you let her. She likes plants — loves them. She also likes to eat them. She likes the rain. I’m glad she stopped drinking from it. She likes the Falcon. She likes to draw — I can’t draw for shit. She’s good at drawing and scavenging and fighting and flying. She’s a bit wild in bed. She snores. She steals the covers. She’s a— oh._

“Threepio.”

“Yes, Master Ben?”

“What do you know about Nabooian wedding traditions?”

***

“Hrung?”

“Ready!”

Chewie raises Rose in his arms so she can reach a higher branch of the tree. “I _love_ this idea,” she says excitedly, delicately picking another blossom and placing it in her basket before Chewie puts her down again.

Ben stretches his arms to grab a couple more blossoms. “Really? You don’t think it’s… stupid?” He asks, voice going down to a small whisper in the last word. It’s not as if he believes Rose is going to berate him for his idea — but after a decade or so of being silently convinced, or expressly told in no uncertain terms, that his every single thought was wrong, expressing himself out loud still comes with the instinctive expectation of Snoke’s derision.

Rose waves the question away with no ceremony, while she examines the leaves in search for more flowers to pick. “Don’t be silly, of course not.”

“Ghhhrrrrrh aaaggghnruh raaaaaahhgh hgggrrrrh ghhhghghghhhgh,” Chewie adds.

Ben glares at him. “Thanks, uncle Chewie.” He doesn’t dare say anything else, because Chewie just happens to be right.

_“…which is a symbol of how two lives are joining into one single purpose, and shall remain strong and united despite the pressures and changes that the future may bring.” And after a brief pause, “This is all I know about wedding traditions of Naboo, sir.”_

_Ben blinked at C-3PO. That… was a lot of information at once. He wasn’t sure he'd processed half of it, but one thing stood out among the rest._

_“So they use orange blossoms for the proposal?”_

_“Yes, sir. It’s customary to lay a basket of orange blossoms at the door of the human one wishes to marry.”_

_“I see,” Ben said, his mind racing a thousand parsecs an hour as he weighed the pros and cons, not even listening as C-3PO continues:_

_“The betrothed pair will then share a beverage made from those same blossoms. Most commonly, they drink Blossom wine, but it can really be anyt—”_

_Ben interrupts him. “Threepio, are there orange trees here in Ajan Kloss?”_

“It’s a beautiful gesture,” Rose reassures him as the three of them walk back to the base; behind them, Chewie agrees with an emphatic _“Grrrrrrrrgaahga”_. “She’s going to love it, she’s going to say ‘yes’, and then I can take her somewhere for a nice dress — probably Coruscant. Or maybe Chandrila,” she adds, thoughtfully. “I like Chandrilan styles better. Just make sure you do it fast so I can take her there before your joint mission on Birren.”

The authoritative tone amuses him, and he mutters a “Yes, ma’am,” that gets him a small punch in the arm.

A couple of hours later, while most of the Resistance gathers in the dining hall for their midday meal, Ben Solo creeps down the hall of the tenth floor with a basket and gently places it in front of a specific door, before hurrying back downstairs. All he needs now is for the flowers not to wither before Rey finds them. And for Rey not to eat them.

***

The entire afternoon goes by with him helping Rose in the Engineering Corps department, while the evening is occupied with a meeting with the High Command.

 _“It’s gonna be real quick,”_ Dameron had assured him, and Ben had been gracious enough to pretend to believe it. No strategic meeting is ever ‘real quick,’ he knows that from experience. And so, making himself as comfortable as possible on a chair that is much too small for him, Ben spends the next few hours listing every single piece of information he knows about Lady Eldrel, the First Order-chosen governor of Birren. By the time the meeting is over and he is dismissed, it’s already close to midnight.

Tired as he is, his heart hammers in his chest as he goes upstairs. No matter how many things demanded his time and focus today, the thought of Rey and the proposal was always there, in the back of his mind, yanking at the ends of his attention like an annoying competitor in the worst kind of tug of war.

As soon as he opens the door to his dorm, however, his heart stutters: Rey is sitting on his bed.

With part of her hair down, and wearing her long, thick nightgown of undyed Byssus-wool that she saves for winters, Rey is sitting on his bed, looking like the very picture of comfort and home. At least, this is what he thinks home should feel and look like. Looking up at him, her smile brightens up the room like a supernova in deep space; and despite every survival instinct that tells him not to, despite everything he taught himself, he smiles back.

“Hi,” she says, and it takes him a moment to remember to answer, so hypnotized he is by the dimples on her cheek. If he were on a ship of which he’d lost control being swallowed by a black hole, he wouldn’t be falling into it any faster than he falls for those dimples every time they happen to him.

“Hey yourself,” he says, quietly closing the door behind him. Before he can say another word, he gets a whiff of something in the air, a familiar scent, but he can’t quite—

He holds his breath.

Orange blossom.

So here she is, waiting for him with a smile and, hopefully, an answer to his proposal. A part of him (the logical one) argues that a ‘yes’ is only to be expected; after all, haven’t they been living like husband and wife for the past year, in practice if not in name? Aren’t they literally each other’s halves? There’s only one possible answer here.

Another part, however (the part that delights in reminding him of Snoke and Hux, and Ren and Voe, and the fear with which Luke stared at him that fateful night) whispers that he’s a fool for entertaining the thought that anyone might want to spend the rest of their lives with him, let alone Rey. She won’t want that. She can literally—

“Sir!”

Ben almost jumps as C-3PO suddenly pops up in front of him.

“Rey has come to visit you!”

Biting back the first impulse at a snarky comeback, Ben grits his teeth for a fleeting second before nodding.

“Thank you, Threepio.”

“You’re welcome, sir.”

He registers Rey’s snort but chooses not to make eye contact with her, or she’ll burst into laughter outright. Behind C-3PO, R2 lets out a couple of inquisitive beeps, to which Ben answers in a flash, “Yes, thank you, Artoo.”

The droids immediately obey and leave the room. Once the door closes behind them:

“How did you know?” Rey asks, eyes sparkling as her smile widens.

He blinks at her. “Sorry?”

“The tea! How did you know this is my favorite?”

That’s when he notices Rey has two cups in her hands, full to the brim with something so hot that the steam coming out of it looks almost solid against the chilly air. Not knowing how to answer a question he doesn’t really understand, Ben crosses the distance between the door and the bed in two steps and sits next to her on the bed. The floral scent becomes stronger, and he realizes that’s what’s in the cups: orange blossom tea.

“So it is your favorite,” he says carefully, like this is a fact he’d been 99.9% sure of before, and this is the last piece of confirmation he needed.

Rey nods enthusiastically. “It is! I mean, I’m sure there are many other kinds of tea that I don’t know — not a lot of tea in Jakku,” she adds, too matter-of-factly for Ben’s taste. “The options there for the cold are hot water and hot happabore milk. But your mom loved tea, so when we all settled on Ajan Kloss…”

“She gave you all possible kinds of tea to try, didn’t she?” Ben asks, eyebrows raised in amusement. There’s a reason why he’s addicted to tea to this day, and that reason was Leia Organa. He can well picture his mother sliding Rey a cup of tea in every meeting.

She looks down at her cup, her smile turning rueful in remembrance. “She did, yeah.”

They both fall silent, with Rey staring down at her tea, and Ben picking at his cuticles. On some days it feels like it really has been a year, and he’s ready to talk about his mom; on other days, it feels like yesterday when he sensed his mom’s strong, unmistakable presence aboard the _Raddus,_ sensed her pleading with _him,_ and the words die in his throat, choosing to flee so as to fight on a better day.

But that’s the thing about having a better half: you can always count on them to fight for you when you can’t fend for yourself. Which is why Rey comes to his rescue with a “And after lots and _lots_ of tea, I decided I like this one best. I don’t know how you guessed it, but…” She leans forward and gives him a kiss. “Thank you. It’s been a while, I haven’t had time to collect the blossoms myself! Now I’ll have tea for days!”

Ben looks at her. She hasn’t… she doesn’t— she has _no idea_ what the basket meant, does she?

Swallowing a sigh, Ben leans against the wall behind them, closing his eyes. “Good. I’m glad you liked it,” he says softly, vaguely pleased at how he manages to answer with a truth, at least. He takes a sip, and the tea goes down hot, strong, and just the right amount of sweet.

_Like Rey._

“And how was your day?” He asks, trying not to sound too tired. All the work and anxiety of the day comes crashing down on him, and now he’s fighting a battle between staying awake so he can be with Rey — listen to her, look at her, watch her smile, tuck her next to him as they go to bed together — and allowing sleep to take him already so he can forget he _failed_ to propose to the only person he will ever be in love with.

In the end, the decision is not up to him: Rey’s tale of how she and Klaud had finally managed to fix the shield generator of one of the T-70 X-wings lulls him to sleep before he realizes it, and the last thing he’s aware of is lying in bed and cornering himself against the wall to make room for her.

He only lets himself truly fall asleep when he feels her safely in his arms.

**IV**

“Rey?”

Startled, Rey turns off the holoprojector; a mere instinct at first, put in action when she heard the door of the library open, but she immediately congratulates herself on it when she realizes the person coming in is Finn. If there’s one person on the base whom it’s safer to inform of her plans _afterwards,_ instead of before, it’s Finn.

“Hi!” she says cheerfully — perhaps a bit _too_ cheerful.

He looks from her to the holoprojector, and back at her again with mild curiosity. “Doing research?”

 _I guess it classifies as research._ “Uhh, yeah! Sure!”

“About Birren?” he asks, pulling up a chair next to her. On any other day, Rey would’ve loved the company, but not today. Today she’s here, in this tiny library, exactly because she wanted to be alone; not many people spend their free time here.

_Ben scoffed. “They have some nerve to call this a library.”_

_“It is one,” Rey replied, staring at him in disbelief._

_“Only in the broadest, roughest sense of the word,” he said, his eyes scanning the place up and down. “One table, three chairs and two shelves of holobooks hardly qualifies as a library. But well,” he shrugged, “it’s temporary. I’m sure there are_ actual _libraries on whatever planet they choose as the new capital.”_

_An ‘actual’ library. What would that even look like?_

_As if reading her thoughts, Ben gives her a sideways glance that she catches just before he looks away again. “Would you like to see one? A real one?” he asks, his eyes glued to the nearest shelf in the worst pretense of casualness she has ever seen — and she’s friends with Finn, she speaks from experience._

_She takes a deep breath. What in the galaxy_ wouldn’t _she like to see? “I’d love to.”_

_He turns to her, and in the eyes that she was so used to seeing nothing but intense hurt and even more intense craving, there’s nothing now but tenderness and warmth._

_“I’ll take you to one.”_

“No, not about Birren, exactly,” is the answer she gives Finn. The ‘exactly’ is a wild maneuver she throws in there, in the hopes that it’ll make him believe her research has something to do with the upcoming mission, and not ask beyond that.

“Is it about Lila Eldrel?”

Maneuver failed. “N-no, not that either.”

“We already know everything there is to know about her from official files. Now we’re counting on Solo to give us info that _isn’t_ public record.” After a pause, Finn lets out a small, scornful chuckle. “At least he’s useful.”

And _that_ is exactly why Rey is not telling him until after the fact. After years of training and conditioning at the hands of the First Order, avoiding ‘Kylo Ren’ is like second nature to Finn, and after being almost killed by him on Ilum, hating him is a more than natural consequence. Finn has come around enough to believe Ben’s repentance is genuine, and has even stopped calling him ‘Kylo Ren’ after some months, but _liking_ him, or thinking his and Rey’s relationship is a good idea, are steps still out of his reach at the moment. Rey doesn’t try to rush it; she neither needs Finn’s approval nor wants to force him into anything. If it happens, great, if it doesn’t, well, that’s just how life goes. You rarely get what you want from it.

Nevertheless, she quirks an eyebrow at him in a light reproach, and Finn puts his hands up. “Fine, fine. I’ll admit, his knowledge of the situation really came in handy, we’d probably be flying bind without it.” His forehead furrowed. “So what kind of research were you doing?”

“Nothing important,” she says, getting up from her chair in a flash. “Let’s go downstairs? I was thinking of trying to get something from the kitchen. Maybe some grilled Falumpaset cheese?”

Finn raises his eyebrows. “Yeah, sure! Let’s go.”

Relieved, Rey hurries towards the door, not even bothering to put the holobook back in its place — Beaumont Kin can do that later — positive that Finn is right behind her. Instead, she hears a beep, followed by a faint buzz, and she turns around: the slim, translucent page she’d been just reading is up again, emitting its bluish glow in the dim lighting of the room. Hands in his pockets, Finn calmly reads aloud the page open in front of him.

_**Section V. Engagement** _

**_Braids can also indicate a proposal of marriage. The Proposal Braid dates back to 14,827 BBY, and has been the main form of marriage proposal in Alderaanian culture ever since._ **

**_Either half of the couple, regardless of gender, may present themselves to their intended with the braid, and if accepted, the proposal will be answered by their betrothed also braiding their own hair in the same style, if possible. If not possible, due to the length of their hair, the proposal can also be answered by both of them undoing the braid together, indicating that, whatever problems cross their path in the future, they shall work to untangle it together, as one._ **

“Yeah, I agree,” Finn mumbles.

“Agree with what?” Rey asks, suspiciously.

He turns around, his lips turned into a thin line. “I agree this is not _exactly_ about Birren.”

She rolls her eyes, but doesn’t answer.

“Alderaanian marriage proposals? Really, Rey?!”

“And why not?” she asks, jutting her chin up in defiance. “You and Poe are engaged. D’Acy and Tyce are married. Chewie is married. Why can’t I get married too?”

“Of course you can get married! But… you really want to marry _him?_ ”

“ _He_ has a name,” she says coldly, going past Finn and turning the projector off once again, “and yes, I do.”

“And why Alderaanian traditions?!”

Rey doesn’t answer right away. If there’s anyone on the base to whom she can safely say _‘I don’t know the traditions of my home planet, because I don’t know where I was born, nor where my parents were from,’_ and have them relate, that person is Finn. But certainty of being understood doesn’t help make her want to say it aloud.

After a brief pause, she settles for, “You know Leia always tried to keep the traditions of Alderaan alive whenever she could, and Ben was raised in an Alderanian household. I thought it made sense.”

Finn pinches the bridge of his nose and takes a deep breath. Looks up at her. “You know what I think about the guy, right?”

Crossing her arms, she leans against the table and gives him a tight-lipped smile. “I do, yeah. Good thing you’re not the one in charge of this decision, then.”

“Fine,” he sighs, putting his hands up in a sign of defeat. “If you’re sure—”

“I am.”

“— then there’s only one thing left for me to do.”

Rey swallows a sigh. All of this is why she tried to avoid having this conversation. Presenting the wedding as an immutable fact rather than a future plan would’ve been the best course of action. Now she’ll have to hear about how he doesn’t condone their relationship, how ‘Solo’ went from light to dark once before and he might do it again, how he, Finn, cannot stand by and watch Rey destroy her own life… They’ve had this exhausting conversation before, and she’s not looking forward to having it again. If he starts down that path, she just might walk out that door.

“Which is?” she asks him drily.

With a shrug, Finn pulls up a chair again and sits at the table, turning the projector back on.

“Learn how to braid your hair that way,” he says, pointing at the image on the page, illustrating the Proposal Braid. “Not many Alderaanians around, and that looks complicated.”

She stares at him. “Really?”

“Yeah! I mean, half of your hair will be down, right?, while the other half is… in two braids, apparently. And then you cross them…? Wait, let me zoom— ”

Before Finn can reach the zoom button or complete his sentence, Rey wraps him in a hug.

In her hug, there are fourteen years of wait.

Fourteen years on Jakku, made of nothing but longing and yearning and waiting, and no one had ever come — no one but Finn. Finn, who took her off the cursed desert, who insisted on taking her hand every time she thought she could do something alone, and who came for her even in the depths of the place he most wanted to escape. Two years later, and Finn still came for her, no matter the circumstances.

“Thank you,” she whispers.

***

Once she and Klaud are finally done fixing the X-wing, Rey practically runs out of the docking area and towards the showers. She has very little time before the evening meal to wash and dry her hair, and even less time after the meal to go to Finn’s room so he can help her with the braid.

_“According to this, it’s usually a parent or sibling who helps with the Proposal Braid.” He grins at her. “You’ll just have to do with the next best thing.”_

_She smiles back. “Can’t think of anyone better.”_

With both Ben and Finn stuck in the meeting about Birren, she has no choice but to go back to her dorm and wait for a message from Finn; once she gets out of the elevator and spots her own door, however, she frowns: there’s a basket on her doorstep. Coming closer, she realizes it’s a basket of flowers, but it’s only when she’s two steps away from it that she recognizes the fragrance of orange blossoms.

And in the middle of them, placed atop one of the flowers, there’s a simple card with _Ben_ artfully lettered, and she smiles. No other person in the galaxy would think to send her flowers, but Ben still felt the need to identify himself. Making use of his brand new calligraphy set, no less.

And _orange blossoms!_ It’s been months since she had orange blossom tea! How does he know?

Then again, what part of her doesn’t Ben know?

With that thought sending her heart into a state between warm turbulence and chaotic flutter, she goes into the small refresher adjoining her room to wash the flowers. There are enough of them to make tea for herself and Ben for a few days.

***

Once C-3PO lets her in, she makes herself comfortable on the bed, careful not to lean against the wall so as not to disturb the braid Finn put so much work in. She’s been there for less than two minutes when Ben comes in.

“Hi,” she says, and she knows it’s a lost battle: she’s probably smiling too wide, and she must look like a child in this nightgown, with her legs crossed on the bed like this. Not looking uncouth is a ship that, for Rey, has long left the launching bay.

Ben stares at her for a moment — probably because she looks like such a mess; the only part of her that is not completely disheveled right now is the braid, which he can’t see at the moment.

“Hey yourself,” he says softly, closing the door behind him, and it’s all she can do to not close her eyes at the sound of his deep, grave voice. Even when it goes down to a murmur, his voice travels through every single nerve in her body and pools at the pit of her stomach, before slowly venturing even lower.

The things she wants Ben to whisper in her ear as his—

“Sir!”

C-3PO’s sudden interruption startles her so much she feels the tea slosh in the cup.

“Rey has come to visit you!”

Amused, she watches as Ben works his jaw for a second before nodding. “Thank you, Threepio.”

“You’re welcome, sir.”

Unable to hold it in, she snorts. This is their future, isn’t it? A life with C-3PO around the house, being useful, loyal, endearing, and irritating, all at once.

R2 asks if he wants them to leave, and the relief on Ben’s face is palpable. “Yes, thank you, Artoo.”

As the droids leave, Rey takes a deep breath. She thought of a thousand ways to go about the proposal, and in the end, she decided to not say a word about it; instead, she’ll simply _let_ Ben see the braid, and the rest, she’s sure, will follow.

Once Ben turns around again, she asks him, “How did you know?”

“Sorry?”

“The tea! How did you know this is my favorite?”

He crosses the distance between the door and the bed in two steps with his stupidly long legs and sits next to her. “So it is your favorite.”

“It is!” She launches into a conversation about tea, which is honestly the last thing she wants right now. What she _wants_ is an excuse to show Ben her hair, but she can’t do that as naturally as she wants with him sitting right beside her.

As she holds out one cup for him, talking about _his dead mother,_ of all things, she wonders wildly how she’s going to manage it. What possible excuse can she think of to stand up and turn her back on him? Maybe she can say she wants to see something on the shelf? Maybe she can grab his calligraphy set and tell him she wants him to write… something. Anything. _‘Write me something, Ben.’ ‘Like what?’ ‘Anything.’_ What stellar conversation.

“And how was your day?” he asks, and Force, he sounds _exhausted._ According to Rose, Ben had been up and about from the first hours of the morning, only stopping for the midday meal; put that together with that extremely long meeting in the evening, and all he wants now is probably the bed. A _quiet_ bed. Which means Rey can say goodbye to the idea of having him notice her braid while she’s on all fours and he rails her against the mattress. In retrospect, it’s not the best idea: she doubts he would be paying attention to her hair.

It doesn’t take him long to fall asleep right before her eyes, which is only fair. It’s not like her tale of fixing the shield generator of the X-wing is particularly exciting. Silently, she gets off the bed and, after taking the cup out of his hand and placing it on the floor, she takes off his boots and tries to get him to lie on the bed without waking him up. Not the easiest of tasks, with Ben being the behemoth that he is, but she manages enough that Ben, with his last bit of consciousness, adjusts himself and even makes room for her.

“Com’ere,” he slurs, and she smiles. As if she had any intention of going anywhere else.

***

In the morning, part of Rey’s ‘notice my braid as you rail me against the mattress’ idea comes to fruition — but, predictably, it’s not the ‘notice my braid’ bit. Not that she’s complaining, of course.

As they dress themselves again, Rey wonders if she should say something. _‘Ben, did you notice anything special about my hair?’_ Not subtle, perhaps, but desperate times…

“What’s that on your hair?” he asks.

With her pants halfway up her legs, Rey stops.

_He noticed it._

She turns around, completely forgetting to continue dressing herself, only to find Ben frowning. “It’s all tangled up, it looks like a nest.” He nods towards the bed. “Come here.”

“Ben, we _just_ left the bed,” she argues. As if sending a message, she finally pushes her pants all the way up.

He snorts. “I’m glad you think that highly of my stamina, but I just want to help untangle your hair,” he says, sitting on the bed. He pats the mattress in an invitation.

Deflated, Rey obeys. _‘It looks like a nest’_ and _‘untangle your hair’_ are far from the _‘Yes, I will marry you and spend the rest of my life with you’_ that she wanted. Then again, the braid most likely looks like anything _but_ a braid, after she slept full eight hours on it.

As Ben deftly unravels whatever mess is going on in her hair, with gentle fingers that are way too delicate and light for a hand that size, he mutters, “You shouldn’t sleep with your hair tied. You’ll damage it.”

She nods, morose. “Sorry.”

“That’s okay,” he says, and she hears a smile as he adds, “That’s what I’m here for.”

**V**

“This is the last time,” Ben grunts, his lightsaber going through one of the guards as easily as if the man were made of soft butter, “I’ll accept when Dameron says ‘it’s gonna be real quick’.”

Chewie agrees with a “Grrrrrrrumph” and a perfect shot that takes another guard down.

 _“_ _Not to defend Poe or anything,”_ Rey replies in his head, _“but no one knew the state of Birren’s defenses after the fall of the First Order.”_

Ben can see her fighting, even though he can’t see her opponents — but he doesn’t need to see them to know they’re falling one after the other. She seems to be stuck somewhere in the hallway that leads to the cockpit, based on how she’s moving forward, so she should be here in the hold any second. These are not the best trained opponents either of them has ever had, but the sheer numbers make up for it. No matter how many they all mow down, more keep coming through the lowered boarding ramp of the Falcon.

 _“Of course this piece of junk would break down right when we needed to escape,”_ he silently complains. There’s a chuckle in his head, but Rey doesn’t answer beyond that, maybe because of an opponent, maybe because complaining about the Falcon is just par for the course and doesn’t really merit, or need, an answer.

Ben sends a couple of guards flying against a wall and slices the arm of another, while Chewie does the very same with his bare hands (which is frankly terrifying to behold). Slowly but surely, they both work their way out of the number three hold, just in time to see Rey emerge out of the hallway.

Seeing her with his own eyes instead of through the bond, and more importantly, seeing her _intact,_ sends a wave of relief through his body; the problem is, now the three of them are surrounded by guards coming from all possible directions.

 _‘No one knew the state of Birren’s defenses after the fall of the First Order’_ is one giant understatement. During his brief stint as the Supreme Leader, Ben had spent a whole year almost exclusively looking for Rey, trying to access their bond, and left the management of their alliances to Pryce and Hux. Whether the increase of Birrenian defenses had happened during that year, or after the First Order was defeated, is an irrelevant mystery: all that matters now is that Lila Eldrel had been smart enough to know the Resistance, in the name of the temporary galactic government, would come for her as soon as all their attempts at diplomacy inevitably failed.

 _“Don’t pick fights you can’t win,”_ Dameron had said. _“The idea is to bring Eldrel in alive. If that’s not possible, leave as fast as you can, and we’ll think of an attack plan.”_

Well, they _are_ trying to leave. If only Eldrel’s guards would let them.

The trio deals with them as they come; Chewie wreaks havoc with his bowcaster, while Ben and Rey fight the best way they know how nowadays: side by side.

Their bond has been honed to a fine point over the past year, which means he now knows when she needs his help without her even having to call his name in his head. He just _knows._ Just like she never fails to come to his rescue before he even realizes it.

And hasn’t she always?

Here she pulls him by his jacket and they duck just in time to avoid a sword slicing off both of their heads; there he Force crushes a blaster aimed at Rey, before sending the would-be shooter crashing against the ceiling and then against the floor. She dances around Ben and lunges forward to slice someone practically in half, while he stabs someone else over her head.

As she moves, he spots a tiny flash of red on her arm out of the corner of his eye. Thinking she’s hurt, he panics and quickly turns to look, but to his relief it’s no injury, only a ribbon she’s got tied around her wrist.

Suddenly, Ben hears C-3PO’s voice echoing from a few days ago.

_“It’s also common for the couple to tie a fisherman’s knot around each other’s wrists out of the same red ribbon, which is a symbol of how two lives are joining into one single purpose, and shall remain strong and united despite the pressures and changes that the future may bring.”_

The idea grabs hold of him, and he finds it hard to let go even as he pulls a guard towards him and impales him on his lightsaber.

“Where did that ribbon come from?” he asks. It’s a stupid question, but he doesn’t have much leisure at the moment to word it better.

He can feel the confusion on Rey’s voice as she replies, “I had it lying around, I guess? I was gonna wear it on my braid, but I didn’t have time to do it,” she quickly grabs her blaster and shoots someone, “so I left it there.”

When he glances at her back again, Ben holds his breath. Slices someone’s limb. Turns to look again.

“Did my mom teach you to braid your hair like that?”

“Ga rrrooaarrghh huahh?”

“Chewie’s right, I don’t think this is the best time to talk about braids!”

“Did she or did she not?!”

Rey doesn’t answer right away, slightly busy with driving her lightsaber through someone’s leg.

“Yes, she did, how did you know?!”

_“Your uncle Chewie recorded it for us,” his mom said, smiling as she turned on the projector._

_Fascinated, Ben looked at the recording. His parents looked so young! Uncle Luke too, without the beard!_

_“You look so pretty here, mom!”_

_“Thanks, sweetheart. Do you see this?” She pointed at her hair on the projection. “This is a wedding braid. Alderaanians do — did — their hair this way on the day of their wedding. It symbolizes two souls coming together as one,” she explained in a dreamy voice._

_“I like this idea,” Ben said._

_“Do you?”_

_“Mm-hmm.” He pointed at the image. “And who are those bears?”_

“Get behind me,” he grits through his teeth, and doesn’t give her time to answer: stepping in front of her, he desperately swings his lightsaber as if it were a morning star, without the least pretense at finesse or technique. In a couple of seconds, the guards that surrounded him have all hit the floor.

“Rey,” he says, grabbing her hand for a quick second, “will you marry me?”

Her eyes widen, but the conversation is cut short by the next wave of guards shooting at them; Rey deflects half of the shots with her lightsaber and Ben stops the other half mid-air, sending them back to where they came from.

When their eyes meet again, there’s a smile on her lips that spell nothing but a ‘yes’ — but when she does speak, it’s a very different word.

“Chewie!”

“Chewie?” Ben echoes, confused.

“Arrrgrrr?”

“Marry us!” Rey demands. Relieved, Ben parries the blow of a lance, cutting it and its wielder in half.

“Grrrrafffffffffgrrr!” Chewie replies, knocking the heads of two guards together. “Arrrrgggg grrrrrrrraaaaaaarrrrph!”

“I know you’re not,” she yells over the sound of those heavy body armors being clanged together, “but there’s an old rule that says that a second mate—”

“— can marry the captain and the first mate—” Ben continues, ducking and bringing Rey with him as another guard shoots at them, “— if they’re marrying each other!”

“Awwwrrr!”

“Now, uncle Chewie, please!”

There’s a grunt that is due either to Chewie’s frustration with the stupidity of the idea, or to how he just ripped someone else’s arm. Ben would rather not know which.

“Grrrrrrraaaarrrrrrr Grrrrrummpgh?”

Ben kicks someone in the stomach, elbows someone else in the face, and brings Rey flush against him with his free hand. “I do.”

“Grrrrrrraaaarrrrrrr Grrrrrgeeer?” The sound of the bowcaster being fired reaches their ears, but they can’t see it from here.

Force stopping someone else in the middle of their movement, Rey smiles at Ben. “I do too.”

“Gu waagaa! Ahawag!”

Splaying both of his hands out, then slowly balling them up in fists, Ben Force crushes the weapons of all the guards around them, murmuring, “You don’t have to tell me tw—”

Rey pulls him down by his collar and kisses him.

***

The journey back home is a quiet one. With Chewie soundly snoring on the bunk in the main hold, and the boarding ramp with a temporary fix that barely holds it together, Rey and Ben stand in the cockpit, face to face.

“‘—two lives joined in one purpose, vowing to remain united against the pressures and changes of the future,” he says, just as Rey finishes tying the knot around his wrist as well. “Or at least, that’s the idea, I’m sure I’m not recalling the exact words,” he says apologetically.

She smiles at him. Only Ben would think he needs to remember the _exact_ words a droid told him about Nabooian weddings so that their own can be more valid somehow.

“I won’t hold it against you,” she says. “Now sit so I can braid your hair.”

“So bossy,” he mumbles, and he’s so bad at being impassive these days that his effort in holding back a smile is so visible one could probably see it from the depths of the Unknown Regions.

“Instead of being a smartass,” she replies, carefully separating the locks to start the braid — a bit hard, considering it’s all sweaty now, but she’ll do her best, “tell me what your mom said about the Wedding Braid.”

“She said it symbolizes two souls coming together as one,” he says softly.

For a few seconds, Rey has more difficulty in braiding Ben’s hair than she thought she would at first; she can’t quite tell the locks apart through the tears. She does what she can to blink them away, but also knows that her silence doesn’t fool him for one bit.

“Though I think technically we’re already two souls that came together as one,” he adds.

“Is that how this dyad thing works?”

He shrugs. “Who knows how this dyad thing works?”

After a couple of minutes of trial and error, Rey steps back.

“Done. It’s not perfect, but it’ll do for the moment.”

Ben chuckles. “Just like me, then.”

She rolls her eyes. There will probably never be an ending to Ben’s self-deprecating humor. Or his self-deprecation as a whole. But that’s fine, she loves him more than enough for both of them.

Sitting on his lap, she wraps her hands around his neck. “Not true. The braid is just for the moment.”

A boyish grin forms almost immediately on Ben’s face. “And I…?”

“ _You_ are for the rest of my life,” Rey says, leaning forward to steal another kiss from her husband.

_For the rest of my life and beyond._

**Author's Note:**

> Here you are, bluebutterflykisses! I took your "Ben and Rey both trying to propose to each other at the same time" and ran with it XD. I hope you enjoy it! ♥
> 
> Most of the things Chewie says can be inferred from context, but I'd like to highlight his most savage line, which happens to be the hardest one to infer:
> 
> “Ghhhrrrrrh aaaggghnruh raaaaaahhgh hgggrrrrh ghhhghghghhhgh,” Chewie adds.  
>  **(This is the first good idea you've ever had!)**  
>  Ben glares at him. “Thanks, uncle Chewie.” He doesn’t dare say anything else, because Chewie just happens to be right.
> 
> The scene where they get married is very obviously based on Will and Elizabeth's wedding in _Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End_ , and the title comes from their dialog in that scene as well! I mean, I couldn't have them planning all these elaborate proposals and NOT have them get married in the most chaotic way possible!  
> I read (probably on twitter or tumblr XD) the thing about the second mate being allowed to officiate a wedding in the very, VERY specific situation of the captain and first mate marrying, and I thought "well, Idk if it's true, but I know I'm gonna use it!"
> 
> Here are the [rebloggable](https://thehobbem.tumblr.com/post/643757908203536384/in-sickness-and-in-health-with-health-being-less) and [RTable](https://twitter.com/thehobbem/status/1363569428156329986) posts promoing the fic, if you'd like to help me spread the word!
> 
> Come find me on [Tumblr](http://thehobbem.tumblr.com/) and [Twitter](https://twitter.com/thehobbem), where I rant, reblog, and generally make a fool of myself! ♥


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